Dow AgroScience has created a strain of corn that has been genetically engineered to withstand an herbicide called 2,4-D, a known carcinogen and one of the two ingredients in the infamous Agent Orange. Dow is now seeking to freely use this 2,4-D-resistant corn. GE modification to create resistance means they will be free to use ever-increasing amounts of the herbicide, with no limits whatsoever.

The National Organics Standards Board (NOSB) recommended that DHA and ARA oils be added to the Certified Organic list.

As things stand now, the DHA and ARA oils are produced through genetic engineering, processed with volatile synthetic solvents, and microencapsulated—three things that are expressly banned from USDA Organic!

Please contact the National Organics Program immediately and ask them to reject the NOSB’s recommendation on DHA and ARA. GMO and synthetic chemical solvents have no place in organic food, much less baby food, and should be banned immediately, not allowed to remain while the rulemaking process lumbers on.

Rep. Dennis Kucinich has introduced two bills that would that would mandate labeling and stricter safety protections for GE products.

Legislation like Rep. Kucinich’s is desperately needed as GMO infiltrates more and more products—even some that are Certified Organic. Please tell Congress and President Obama that we don’t want genetically engineered products, and we demand to know when GMOs are in our food!

The USDA has released an Environmental Assessment report for corn that Monsanto has genetically engineered to be drought-tolerant. The agency is considering either keeping the corn under regulation, or assigning it nonregulated status (banning it altogether is off the table). The comment period is open until July 11.

The USDA has released an Environmental Assessment report for cotton, which Syngenta Biotechnology has genetically engineered to be pest-resistant. USDA believes the cotton is “unlikely to pose a plant pest risk.” Tell the USDA that the cotton must not be deregulated—that without strict controls, GE crops will encroach on non-GE crops, contaminating them, including organic crops—which will, of course, render them non-organic.

Currently, the USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) prepares an Environmental Assessment (EA) or an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) to show what impact a GE food or organism might have on the environment, to help determine whether it should be regulated or not. But now, under APHIS’ new pilot program, the petitioner will submit the environmental documents and analysis themselves.

And instead of APHIS taking the analysis and developing an EA or EIS, an outside contractor will prepare the EIS—but the petitioner will provide the funds for it. This is another outrageous conflict of interest: petitioners will be providing the funds to support their own studies to determine the outcome of their own case.

Tell USDA that this new program is unconscionable, and ask them to shelve it immediately.

The USDA has reviewed Monsanto’s brand of Roundup Ready alfalfa and sugarbeets—genetically engineered to withstand the harsh herbicide glyphosphate, a.k.a. Roundup—and decided that genetically engineered (GE) alfalfa did not need to be regulated at all, and that sugarbeets will be “partially deregulated”. We need to blanket Congress with protests, asking senators and representatives and oversight committees to review the deregulation decision.

Say No to Frankenfish

Tell the FDA’s Veterinary Medicine Advisory Committee to bar the sale of AquAdvantage salmon because of both the documented and the unknown health risks associated with genetically modified organisms. To allow genetically modified (GM) salmon, which contains antifreeze genes from the ocean pout–an eel-like creature from an entirely different family of marine organisms–to be sold for food to American consumers is nothing short of outrageous. Because scientific studies on the salmon have not been released, no one can review them to see if any of these burdens have been met. How can AquaBounty Technologies possibly prove that this new gene-spliced salmon is completely safe for human consumption over the long term, if there haven’t been carefully constructed double-blind studies of these fish being consumed over many years?

Demand that the FDA, if it approves the application for AquAdvantage salmon, ensure that all such fish are clearly labeled as genetically modified at the point of sale. We strongly urge your Agency to deny the approval of this salmon, and feel even more strongly that any genetically modified fish must be clearly labeled as such. Consumers should be allowed to make informed decisions, if you do not label a product as having been genetically modified, you are in effect preventing the public from choosing non-GMO foods.

A rider has been added, to the House Agriculture Appropriations bill that would strip federal courts of the authority to halt the sale and planting of illegal, potentially hazardous GE crops while USDA is performing an environmental impact statement.

The parent companies of a number of food brands donated large sums of money to fight Prop 37 (the California Right to Know Act, a.k.a. Label GMO). In addition to spending millions to stop GMO labeling in California, these companies also supported disinformation campaigns in which wild charges were made, such as the completely incorrect charge that labeling GMO will greatly increase food prices.

Sign this pledge, and tell these secretive parent companies funding the other side that you and your family will not buy from companies that fought to keep GMOs from being labeled!

The parent companies of a number of food brands donated large sums of money to fight Prop 37 (the California Right to Know Act, a.k.a. Label GMO).In addition to spending millions to stop GMO labeling in California, these companies also supported disinformation campaigns in which wild charges were made, such as the completely incorrect charge that labeling GMO will greatly increase food prices. Sign this pledge, and tell these secretive parent companies funding the other side that you and your family will not buy from companies that fought to keep GMOs from being labeled!

Last week we sent an emergency email to our subscribers about a terrible biotech rider attached to the big must-pass Appropriations bill that would let GMO crops be planted even when a court has ordered a stop. The Senate rejected this provision in the past—but now they may be accepting it as part of some back-room deal that was struck.

At this very moment, a Continuing Resolution (CR) for the big Appropriations funding bill (H.R. 933) is being debated in the Senate. It’s supposed to be about funding the government, but the Senate Appropriations Committee, chaired by Sen. Barbara Mikulski (who has always stood by our side in the past), has included a dangerous GMO rider that has no place in a funding bill.

February 1, 2011Let’s really put the pressure on! Let the USDA and your senators and representative know there’s a steep political price for this decision, which if left unchanged, will have devastating consequences for organic agriculture.

September 14, 2010This week we have a duo of news briefs that update previous Pulse of Natural Health stories: your private medical records may be at greater risk than ever—and a new GMO lawsuit against the USDA.

A high-profile legal battle over genetically modified crops continues. The US Supreme Court in a 7-1 decision yesterday (June 21) did not accept a lower court’s total nationwide ban on GM alfalfa. But it did agree that the seeds could be dangerous and did not allow Monsanto to proceed with selling them. The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) must now complete a study examining whether the seeds will harm the environment before approving them for restricted planting, a process that could go into next year, and which could lead to more litigation.

Last week the New York Times wrote about an upcoming report from The President’s Cancer Panel. The paper was “astonish[ed] to learn that [the panel] is poised to join ranks with the organic food movement and declare: [these] chemicals threaten our bodies.”

In recent articles, we’ve touched on the subject of genetically modified organisms (GMOs): their potential to contaminate organic crops, the hugecorncomplete failure to test their safety for your health or the environment, and the failure of labels to alert shoppers to the presence of GMOs in foods they’re considering buying. We now have some updates. Read More>>

Why Genetically Engineered Crops Threaten Your Health

December 22, 2009

If you listen to political talk-radio, you may have been puzzled by recent ads about seeds. Why would anyone be concerned about access to seeds? Because approximately 82 percent of the global seed supply is patented and owned by a handful of big corporations. Just six companies — DuPont, Monsanto, Bayer, Syngenta, BASF and Dow — control about 75 percent of the global agro-chemical market .

Genetically modified organisms, or GMO foods, are on grocery store shelves already. They are present in nearly 80% of processed foods that contain crops such as corn and soy and their byproducts. The long-term effects on human health and the environment from these non-natural products are unknown. A federal survey has revealed that most Americans want these foods labeled in order to make an informed decision about what they and their families eat each day.

On February 6, the FDA made history by approving the first drug made with materials from genetically engineered (GE) goats. One of the most distressing concerns is that the FDA will not require all products from genetically engineered foods and animals to be so labeled.

Approving Foods from Genetically Engineered Animals, the FDA Promises a New, Open Process

January 27, 2009

Foods and drugs from genetically engineered animals are back in the news with the FDA’s announcement of a new, open process for their approval. However, the FDA does not require genetically engineered food to be so labeled, nor has there been any study of the potential environmental impact of genetically engineered animals.

The governments of the US and Canada stand in sharp contrast to sixty other countries around the world, including the European Union, Russia, and China, by not requiring foods that contain genetically modified organisms (GMOs) to be so labeled. They do so despite good evidence that GMOs could have negative health implications for humans and the environment, and despite the fact that 87% of American consumers want products that contain GMO ingredients to be labeled.

In a move that is expected to have a direct impact on your dinner table, the FDA has released proposed guidelines on how to regulate genetically engineered animals. With millions of cases of food-borne illness each year in the U.S., and troubling issues of food labeling and GMO (genetically modified organisms) animals in the food chain, food safety remains a huge concern for the public.

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